Inglourious Basterds

Director: Quentin Tarantino

Screenwriter: Quentin Tarantino

Cast: Brad Pitt (The Curious Case of Benjamin Button), Mélanie Laurent, Christoph Waltz, Eli Roth (Death Proof), Diane Kruger (National Treasure, Troy)

Length: 2h 33m

Synopsis: A small group of American soldiers are secretly dispatched into Nazi occupied France during World War II with intentions of striking fear into the entire Third Reich by killing as many Nazis as they can as brutally as they can. Their plans eventually become intertwined with those of an escaped Jewish-French girl who, having endured witnessing her entire family’s death at the hands of the Nazis, forms an attack plan of her own.

Analysis: There is a certain list of things that one can very reasonably predict to be in a Quentin Tarantino film — patiently paced scenes with extended dialogue, brutal violence, close-ups of women’s feet, and the occasional breaking of the fourth wall, to name a few. Such things are what help make Tarantino an auteur. But perhaps what sets him apart from the many other Hollywood directors the most is his affection for counterculture. At first, such an observation seems disappointingly and even painfully evident. A man who directs films like Pulp Fiction, From Dusk Till Dawn, and Death Proof is expected to love counterculture. However, there is more to his expression of such affection than just the subject matter of his films. Inglourious Basterds displays his continuing fondness for the unexpected and unusual by taking familiar content (WWII) and portraying it in his own style. The resulting effect is the construction of a universe very dissimilar from what we as audiences normally expect (at least from more popular directors like Spielberg or Eastwood). The existence of this world is precisely what makes the film worth our interest.

For this reason alone, it can be said that each of Tarantino’s films are worth taking note of (the Kill Bill films immediately come to mind). But where the director enters new territory is his decision to make unusual a world that Americans, and indeed people all over the world, have become very familiar with thanks to a gargantuan volume of other films that deal with the same subject matter (WWII). Reservoir Dogs, though it takes place in a recognizable and realistic setting and situation, was new and unusual because it revealed a side to robbery that gets little attention in film; that of the immediate occurrences following a heist gone bad. The Kill Bill films’ ties to anime and kung-fu cinema made it highly bizarre to the casual filmgoer. But even such casual viewers are laden with expectations when they sit down to a picture about World War II, if for no other reason than because certain facts about that war are ingrained into our common knowledge due to basic education (though as aforementioned, earlier movies play a large role in the forming of that knowledge too). It is this manipulation of expectations by way of twisting/distorting commonly known facts that gives Inglourious Basterds its most notable flare.

When exposed to such films as this, the term “artistic liberties” instantly comes to mind. We are given a sense of these liberties with the incorrect spelling of the film’s title (which Tarantino reportedly vows to never explain). And like the title, Tarantino has decided to rewrite historical fact (which artists who might be categorized as being proponents of counterculture are known to occasionally do. Also, the film’s opening words “Once upon a time…” are indicative of our transcendence into this world of fantasy). This rewriting, though certainly expertly crafted into a story that bleeds entertainment, was ostensibly done to satisfy us on levels beyond the humorous and exciting. It is reasonable to suggest that it was also meant to be emotionally and psychologically cathartic. One need only look at our own societal frustration with the current war on terror, for example, to see where this supposed desire for release stems. Without Tarantino’s decision to create the world that he does in Inglourious Basterds, it can be argued that the film’s accomplishments with catharsis would not be nearly as impactful. Of course, however, I can hardly speak for everyone.

Rating: 8.5